Responding to Eddington

The Eddington report presents a formidable political and social challenge for the Labor movement. Being presented now, just before Australia enters a carbon constrained future and just as the ever increasing prices for petrol are being felt by working people, the Eddington report is a decidingly mixed bag.

Elements that should be welcomed include:

• Upfront commitment to increased investment in public transport
• The commitment to providing high quality public transport links to the transport poor western suburbs
• Commitment to addressing rail capacity
• Commitment to high quality link to the university/hospital/biotechnology precinct – the source of a large number of jobs and education
• Strong commitment to supporting cycling as a key transport mode

Eddington, however, falls into old traps. He relies far too much on the discredited predict and provide model of road planning, and his modelling incorrectly assumes that the massive growth in public transport trips in inner Melbourne (and the decline in car trips) is naught but a temporary aberration.

Roads do not solve congestion. And Eddington’s proposal for an east-west cross city freeway does not recognise this essential fact. There is not the traffic volume to sustain this tunnel as a PPP except at the expense of building interchanges on inner city streets. Already the RACV is calling for an interchange on Nicholson Street. I have little confidence that this government is capable of resisting the pressure of Macquarie and the road building highwaymen.

Eddington’s failure therefore is one of not breaking free of a business as usual response (BAU). His plan:

• is NOT a plan for carbon constrained future
• is NOT a plan for dealing with peak oil and the effects of higher petrol prices
• does NOT address the poverty of transport options in Melbourne’s outer suburbs – particularly the outer north and outer east
• makes no commitment to Labor’s modal shift target of 20 percent public transport journeys by 2020.
• Abandons Labor’s plans of getting more port freight onto rail

So what are the alternatives? Well firstly don’t build the cross city freeway – its got a cost benefit of under 0.9 (ie it will cost us more then it will benefit us) and will only add to congestion. The money can be spent better elsewhere. Some ideas include:

Improve public transport, including rail, in the transport poor outer suburbs (South Morang anyone?)

• Accelerate smart bus and metropolitan bus improvements (expand service span of hours to equivalent of that of the train system)
• Invest in Bus rapid transit to Doncaster, Latrobe Uni, Western suburbs etc with real bus priority (ie, dedicated bus ways like in Brisbane)
• Better road space management and parking policies

There are different options, they just require political will